Materialists......

[DreadNiK]

Mu.

Phi!

 

[LW]

1 + -1 = 0.

Is this 1 + -1 = 0 using the standard mathematical definitions for integers (or real numbers) or are you using the unworkable pseudo-mathematical mess that goes under name "symmetry mathematics"?

 

[I less than three logic]

1 + 1 + 0 = 2

~~ Paul

Should have went with 1 + 1 = 10. He doesn't like 2.

Bender: What a horrible dream. 1's and 0's everywhere, and I thought I saw a 2!
Fry: It's ok Bender, it was just a dream. There's no such thing as 2.

 

[Wudang]

And I think you are way out of your depth, tricky. There's plenty of people who understand this, like, for example, nescafe who responded to my initial post on this with:



He got it, you don't. I'm not going to reply to you anymore on this, Tricky. it is not a matter of opinion. It is a matter of fact - and you aren't in a position to tell me I am wrong. You are not a software engineer. I am.

Hold on, nescafe said "not as easily", not impossible. I have been a software engineer now I'm back to systems programming working on the lower layers that software engineers build on. You argument from authority fails. Besides this is an issue more for a hardware engineer.
http://www.research.ibm.com/journal/rd/443/ashley.pdf
From this you will see that there is no reason in this system for a piece of data to be stored or retrieved as a whole though the actual mechanism enforces a minimum size of data (page) to be stored or retrieved.

 

[UndercoverElephant]

Is this 1 + -1 = 0 using the standard mathematical definitions for integers (or real numbers) or are you using the unworkable pseudo-mathematical mess that goes under name "symmetry mathematics"?

No, it's a lot easier than that. I am offering the only possible answer to the question "How does something come from nothing?" Either one avoids answering it or gives an answer that resembles mine. No other answer is possible.

It's metaphysics for dummies, not alternative mathematics.

 

[DreadNiK]

It's metaphysics for dummies

How very true...

 

[nescafe]

No, it's a lot easier than that. I am offering the only possible answer to the question "How does something come from nothing?" Either one avoids answering it or gives an answer that resembles mine. No other answer is possible.

um, no. Your answer is the answer you find most asthetically pleasing. If you have The Answer, I expect you to be able to derive (in the language of mathematics) the following:

• Proof that your answer is the only consistent answer.
• Derivations of (at least) quantum chromodynamics and general relativity, again phrased in the language of mathematics, and proof of the consistency of your derivations. A set of testable theorems that unify the two would be nice as well, but is not absolutely required.

Saying that "1 + -1 = 0" is not proof of anything metaphysical, and is not even a good metaphor, since set of all ways that tautology can be stated is indenumerably infinite.

 

[DreadNiK]

Saying that "1 + -1 = 0" is not proof of anything metaphysical, and is not even a good metaphor, since set of all ways that tautology can be stated is indenumerably infinite.

No, because there is only *1* perspective, therefore there are no metaphysical numbers apart from 1, or 0 which is the absence of 1.

*sarcasm mode off*

 

[Belz...]

No, it's a lot easier than that. I am offering the only possible answer to the question "How does something come from nothing?" Either one avoids answering it or gives an answer that resembles mine. No other answer is possible.

Unless one considers the question meaningless. But that aside, how does your equation "answer" the question ?

 

[UndercoverElephant]

um, no. Your answer is the answer you find most asthetically pleasing. If you have The Answer, I expect you to be able to derive (in the language of mathematics) the following:

• Proof that your answer is the only consistent answer.
• Derivations of (at least) quantum chromodynamics and general relativity, again phrased in the language of mathematics, and proof of the consistency of your derivations. A set of testable theorems that unify the two would be nice as well, but is not absolutely required.

Saying that "1 + -1 = 0" is not proof of anything metaphysical, and is not even a good metaphor, since set of all ways that tautology can be stated is indenumerably infinite.

I said "How does something come from nothing?" not "Where did the laws of physics comes from?"

These are not the same question, though they are likely to be related. Again, you're making this much more complicated than it needs to be. You seem to be mixing up a question about why there is something rather than nothing with a question about cosmological design.

 

[UndercoverElephant]

Unless one considers the question meaningless. But that aside, how does your equation "answer" the question ?

If it's not obvious how that equation answers the question being discussed, I'm not sure how to explain it to you.

Q: How can something come from nothing?
A: Like this: 0 = 1 + 1

What could be difficult to understand about this?

 

[UndercoverElephant]

BTW,

The reason I am unphased by the criticisms of this suggestion is that nobody is actually taking any notice of the context in which I am suggesting it. Instead, they are picking holes in it or trying to say they don't understand it. But as I explained, this answer can be arrived at by a process of elimination and nobody else has ever suggested a different way of answering the question. Both the theist explanation "It was God." and the materialist explanation "There is no explanation, the Universe just exists." are wholly inadequate. They are non-answers. And when you have a situation where you have only one concievable way of answering a question, then other people nitpicking at it without taking any notice of the fact that there's no other way of answering the question doesn't make much difference to me. If somebody actually came up with a better suggestion or actually took any notice of the inadequacies of the other answers, I'd take rather more notice of them.

 

[nescafe]

If it's not obvious how that equation answers the question being discussed, I'm not sure how to explain it to you.

Q: How can something come from nothing?
A: Like this: 0 = 1 + 1

What could be difficult to understand about this?

Well, for starters you typed it wrong.

For another, 1 - 1 = 0 is exactly mathematically equivalent to 1 + -1 = 0, as is (1 + i) + (-1 -i) + (-1 + i) + (1 - i) = 0. Moreover, these are only "simple" statements from the perspective of human experience (and even then, I am stretching a bit -- negative numbers and the concept of zero as we understand it are fairly recent inventions, complex numbers even moreso). To get an idea as to how complicated your little mathematical metaphor is, take a look at one of the proofs of 2 + 2 = 4.

At best, you may have a useful approximation -- IMAO, all claims (not just yours) of having The Answer To Metaphysics are premature.

 

[hammegk]

SFAIK, the "best" metaphysic a person can strive to find is the one offering the least logical inconsistencies as one attempts to wholly integrate ones' worldview. What individuals "know beforehand" have strong influence in their quest -- should they even bother to consider the question a quest.


Just my 2cts ....

 

[UndercoverElephant]

At best, you may have a useful approximation -- IMAO, all claims (not just yours) of having The Answer To Metaphysics are premature.

Agreed. "Useful approximation" is what was intended. It's a symbolic representation of a pattern which turns up just about everywhere, from physics to taoism to the ups and downs of a human life. There's no action without an equal and opposite reaction. There's no happiness without pain.

Being and non-being create each other.
Difficult and easy support each other.
Long and short define each other.
High and low depend on each other.
Before and after follow each other.

 

[Tricky]

No. What irritates me is that you've got it exactly backwards. Materialism does not assume something is false unless it is proved to exist. Far from it. Materialism is a claim that an external experience-independent physical world exists, even though we could never, ever experience such a thing.

Is that all this is? A very protracted strawman of materialism?

I think you have it just backwards. Materialism is the claim that in order for something to exist, it must be, at least potentially, experiential. Or at the very least, that there is no reason to believe that something exists unless it is potentially experiential, i.e. material. It does not require some mystical "point of view" that is outside our ability to experience.

How can so many people make the same error and not realise they are doing it?

Wife (calling husband on cell phone): Honey, be careful coming home. I just heard on the news there's some idiot driving the wrong way on the highway.

Husband (from car): One idiot? Hell, they're all driving the wrong way.

Here is a short article which explains the point very clearly:

http://easyweb.easynet.co.uk/~ursa/philos/phinow3.htm

Very easy to point out the flaw in that reasoning. It is in the first assumption.

I shall propose it in this formal scheme. The format is that if the premise (1) is true then you can infer the first conclusion (2) and hence the final conclusion (3).

1. It is intrinsically inconceivable that we can ever perform any experiment or observation to detect the presence of X.
2. Therefore any X is indistinguishable from a fiction.
3. Therefore any X is a fiction.If you disagree with this scheme, then I must ask you for a counter-example, or a contrary proof.

Materialism holds that nothing is intrinsically inconceivable to detect via experiment or observation. This is an assumption made by theists, dualists, career philsophy students et. al. but not materialists.

Hello?

Hello dear? About that guy driving the wrong way? I just saw it on the TV and it looks like your car.

 

[nescafe]

Agreed. "Useful approximation" is what was intended. It's a symbolic representation of a pattern which turns up just about everywhere, from physics to taoism to the ups and downs of a human life. There's no action without an equal and opposite reaction. There's no happiness without pain.

Being and non-being create each other.
Difficult and easy support each other.
Long and short define each other.
High and low depend on each other.
Before and after follow each other.

In emptiness there is no form nor feeling, nor perception, nor impulse, nor consciousness ;

No eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, mind ; No forms, sounds, smells, tastes, touchables or objects of mind ; No sight-organ element, and so forth, until we come to :

No mind-consciousness element ; There is no ignorance, no extinction of ignorance, and so forth, until we come to : There is no decay and death, no extinction of decay and death. There is no suffering, no origination, no stopping, no path.

There is no cognition, no attainment and no non-attainment.

So now that we have revealed the bits of woo (yours taoist, mine buddhist) that our metaphysical beliefs rationalize, is it time to end this war between the People's Front of Judea and the Judean People's Front and focus our massive throbbing organs of rationalization on the real non-enemy? It is alot to ask, I know.

 

[Tricky]

In emptiness there is no form nor feeling, nor perception, nor impulse, nor consciousness ;

No eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, mind ; No forms, sounds, smells, tastes, touchables or objects of mind ; No sight-organ element, and so forth, until we come to :

No mind-consciousness element ; There is no ignorance, no extinction of ignorance, and so forth, until we come to : There is no decay and death, no extinction of decay and death. There is no suffering, no origination, no stopping, no path.

There is no cognition, no attainment and no non-attainment.

So now that we have revealed the bits of woo (yours taoist, mine buddhist) that our metaphysical beliefs rationalize, is it time to end this war between the People's Front of Judea and the Judean People's Front and focus our massive throbbing organs of rationalization on the real non-enemy? It is alot to ask, I know.

LOL. EXcellent!

And may I add to Geoff's list:

Subjective and Objective live with each other.

 

[UndercoverElephant]

In emptiness there is no...

No eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, mind ; No forms, sounds, smells, tastes, touchables or objects of mind ; No sight-organ element.....

No mind-consciousness element ; There is no ignorance, no extinction of ignorance, and so forth, until we come to : There is no decay and death, no extinction of decay and death. There is no suffering, no origination, no stopping, no path.

There is no cognition, no attainment and no non-attainment.

Neti Neti.....

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neti_neti

0

 

[Belz...]

If it's not obvious how that equation answers the question being discussed, I'm not sure how to explain it to you.

Q: How can something come from nothing?
A: Like this: 0 = 1 + 1

What could be difficult to understand about this?

I don't know. Maybe if you explained it I'd understand. But if you persist in simply saying that it's obvious, then you'll be the only one to know.